Self-portrait 2020

A devastating portrait of lost dreams, unrealised talent, and the costs of the lack of infrastructural support in the film industry. Penniless filmmaker Lee Dongwoo is approached on the streets of the Jongno district in Seoul by a man looking for money, a serendipitous encounter that leads him to embark on his sophomore feature, Self-portrait 2020. The man, in his fifties, is Lee Sang-yeol: homeless, alcoholic, bipolar and, most importantly, a filmmaker whose short film, Self-portrait 2000, found success on the international film festival circuit 20 years ago. Ever since, his life and career have spiralled downwards: his wife and daughter have left him, and his plans to make his next film have been perpetually postponed. Dongwoo embarks on a precarious collaboration with his unpredictable new friend, but the portrait of his subject soon expands in scope to include not only the homeless community in and around Tapgol Park but also himself, as he begins to see in Sang-yeol a confrontation with his possible future self. (International Film Festival Rotterdam)